{"id":5445,"date":"2026-06-10T15:07:43","date_gmt":"2026-06-10T22:07:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sd41blogs.ca\/couttsa\/?p=5445"},"modified":"2026-06-10T15:07:43","modified_gmt":"2026-06-10T22:07:43","slug":"real-life-design","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sd41blogs.ca\/couttsa\/2026\/06\/10\/real-life-design\/","title":{"rendered":"Real Life Design"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img loading=\"lazy\" class=\"alignleft size-medium wp-image-5449\" src=\"http:\/\/sd41blogs.ca\/couttsa\/files\/2026\/06\/pods3-e1781129151548-300x220.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"220\" srcset=\"https:\/\/sd41blogs.ca\/couttsa\/files\/2026\/06\/pods3-e1781129151548-300x220.jpg 300w, https:\/\/sd41blogs.ca\/couttsa\/files\/2026\/06\/pods3-e1781129151548.jpg 600w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/>Working in groups is a significant part of learning and decision making, in school and many career fields. This requires us to be active listeners and contributors in order to build understanding and work towards a common goal. Recently, it was time for a desk change. We&#8217;ve tried various arrangements throughout the year so far, but this time the students decided on how the desks should be organized.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-5453 alignright\" src=\"http:\/\/sd41blogs.ca\/couttsa\/files\/2026\/06\/pods7-300x225.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"225\" srcset=\"https:\/\/sd41blogs.ca\/couttsa\/files\/2026\/06\/pods7-300x225.jpg 300w, https:\/\/sd41blogs.ca\/couttsa\/files\/2026\/06\/pods7.jpg 640w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/>As a group, we brainstormed the various arrangements experienced in the past, and discussed the possible design constraints (shape and size of the room, number of desks, etc). Then students broke into small groups, where each group used tiles to design a possible layout. They had to discuss and negotiate different possibilities before having to reach a consensus on which design they thought best suited our classroom. They recorded their designs on large paper and outlined pros and cons for their design, considering issues around use of space, mobility, and &#8220;chatter.&#8221; Groups presented their ideas to the whole class, and then students voted.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" class=\"alignleft size-medium wp-image-5454\" src=\"http:\/\/sd41blogs.ca\/couttsa\/files\/2026\/06\/pods8-e1781129031333-288x300.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"288\" height=\"300\" srcset=\"https:\/\/sd41blogs.ca\/couttsa\/files\/2026\/06\/pods8-e1781129031333-288x300.jpg 288w, https:\/\/sd41blogs.ca\/couttsa\/files\/2026\/06\/pods8-e1781129031333.jpg 480w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 288px) 100vw, 288px\" \/>In the end, groups had varying degrees of success in terms of their ability to reach consensus and to express their ideas clearly. The layout that received the most votes was pods of 5 or 6. We agreed that we liked the table-type set-up as it was good for working in groups and for creating space to move throughout the room, but we also recognized that having a pod arrangement could contribute to more off-task talking. We also talked about the importance of self-regulation and making productive choices for ourselves and our learning, as well as our accountability to our classroom community.<\/p>\n<div class=\"mceTemp\"><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Working in groups is a significant part of learning and decision making, in school and many career fields. This requires us to be active listeners and contributors in order to build understanding and work towards a common goal. Recently, it was time for a desk change. We&#8217;ve tried various arrangements throughout the year so far, [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7091,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[7,9,33],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sd41blogs.ca\/couttsa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5445"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sd41blogs.ca\/couttsa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sd41blogs.ca\/couttsa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sd41blogs.ca\/couttsa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7091"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sd41blogs.ca\/couttsa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5445"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/sd41blogs.ca\/couttsa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5445\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5456,"href":"https:\/\/sd41blogs.ca\/couttsa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5445\/revisions\/5456"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sd41blogs.ca\/couttsa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5445"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sd41blogs.ca\/couttsa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5445"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sd41blogs.ca\/couttsa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5445"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}